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Civil law is a broad topic—when writing an essay on it, you could theoretically cover everything from libel laws to alimony. As such, many students are overwhelmed when tasked with writing a paper on this subject. With so many possible issues to cover, they often feel that they don’t know where to start. You may be in this position right now.

Fortunately, many of the topics you might write about in this type of essay are relevant to students today. If you have the freedom to choose your own topic, selecting one that’s relevant to your own life and interests will make it easier to write a compelling, effective paper. Here are some ideas of what to cover in your piece.

Social Media and Libel

Libel and slander laws have clearly been impacted by social media and the Internet. You could easily write a paper on this subject from a number of different perspectives: the evolution of these laws, a specific case, etc. Because the vast majority of students use some form of social media, this subject is very interesting to many young people.

False Light Privacy and the Internet

False light privacy torts refer to cases in which a media outlet publishes information about an individual that, while not as malicious as the information published in most defamation cases, does have an offensive or damaging impact on the individual’s ability to control their own public image. Recent cases, such as Peter Thiel’s case against Gawker Media, prove that the Internet has made this topic particularly relevant.

Student Speech

It’s not hard to imagine why students would find the topic of student speech worthy of their attention. Civil law often overlaps with such issues, especially in regards to a free speech, libel, or slander. A student could investigate recent cases in which students were censored by their universities, and make a case for or against the student using principles from earlier civil law cases.

Class Action Lawsuits

Class actions lawsuits are constantly under fire, often from people representing business interests, who argue that they are frivolous and do unfair damage to companies and organizations. Students looking to write effective papers benefit from choosing topics which give them the opportunity to make strong arguments. As such, writing in support of—or against—class-action lawsuits is a smart way to display your argument skills.

Contract Law

Students will encounter many contracts after graduating. If you write about contract law, you’ll also be able to learn more about an important subject that will apply to your life, especially in the digital age, when contracts are often shared and completed via the Internet.

This is merely a small sampling of the topics you might cover if you’re writing an essay about civil law. As always, pay attention to the strict requirements of the assignment, and contact your instructor if there is anything you don’t understand.

There are a lot of laws in America that sound ridiculous at first. However, not all these laws were passed for absolutely no good reason. Sometimes the law itself originally came to be for very legitimate, practical purposes. Just consider the following examples:

1. It’s Against the Law to Sell Your Eyeballs in Texas

Yes, Texas technically outlaws the black market sale of one’s eyeballs. What people often don’t realize is that this law actually applies to the black market sale or purchase of any major organs. Although it’s highly unlikely that anyone would ever think to sell their eyeballs, because they are organs of the body, they’re included in the law.

2. You Can’t Hunt Camel in Nevada

This definitely seems like an odd law to keep in place. After all, how likely is it that people will hunt camel in Nevada when that particular animal is by no means native to the state?

The truth is, some facilities in the state used to house camels for military training exercises. When some of the animals got lost, it was necessary to create a law protecting them.

3. It’s Illegal to Host a Bear Wrestling Match in Alabama

Ridiculous as it may sound, this law remained on the books for a very simple reason: bear wrestling used to be a fairly common occurrence in Alabama. People saw it as a fun, entertaining way to test out their strengths. However, lawmakers decided that the practice was unsafe for participants and cruel to the animals involved.

4. Hunting Bigfoot Is Illegal in Washington

This is yet another strange law that actually came about as a result of genuine public concern. After the release of the famous Patterson-Gimlin film, which allegedly depicts Bigfoot, people flocked to the area where it was shot, intent on catching a glimpse of the monster.

Some of those people brought along firearms. With too many gun-toting outsiders creating dangerous situations for residents of the area, the local authorities decided to outlaw Bigfoot hunting.

5. You Can Get Arrested for Riding a Horse While Drunk in Colorado

This is one of those leftover laws that occasionally still gets enforced. The law originally came about back during the frontier days, when a lot more people were riding around on horseback in the first place. However, some people still try to use this method of transportation, and it’s easy to see how trying to ride a horse while you’re intoxicated can lead to a dangerous situation.

6. It’s Illegal to Use Profane Language in Front of a Child Under 14 in Georgia

Although it’s possible to argue that this law violates a free speech, it was intended in part to prevent older adolescents from targeting younger kids with sexually harassing language.

There are plenty of laws still on the books that represent outdated ways of thinking. Most of the time, local governments have simply never gotten around to removing them. However, in some cases, these laws exist for completely legitimate reasons.

Everyone from high school history students to college Sociology majors may be tasked with writing a compare and contrast essay on human equality in the USA. To write an effective paper on this topic, it’s important to keep certain tips in mind. Although the specific requirements will vary depending on the nature of the assignment and the expectations of the instructor, there are general suggestions which will typically apply to anyone writing this type of essay.

Use Facts and Statistics: Unless your instructor specifically asks you to write a personal, opinion-based essay about human equality, make sure you include numerous relevant facts, statistics, and figures in your paper. Imagine that you are an attorney making an argument—the more solid evidence you provide, the stronger your argument will be.

Use Reliable Sources: Human equality is a controversial topic. As such, it’s easy to find unreliable sources making false claims. It’s also too easy to find sources which are outdated. When writing your essay, try to use statistics that are from within the past five years, and research all your sources to make sure they’re not biased in one particular direction.

Put It in Context: When writing about human equality—even if you’re writing specifically about current events—you have to remember that historical context is very important, especially in regards to this particular topic. For example, if your paper is about income inequality in the United States, you should include information about historical conditions which contributed to income inequality today.

Be Concise and Professional: Again, unless your professor directly instructed you to write the essay from a personal perspective, try to avoid including personal opinions. Make sure your language is concise, adding real value to your argument instead of just taking up space. The tone of this paper should be professional and informative.

Outline: When writing a compare and contrast essay on human equality in the USA, it’s always a good idea to start with an outline. Decide on the type of argument you are going to make, gather reliable sources that support your argument, then put together an outline to organize your thoughts. Break the essay down into paragraphs you expect to include, and find the specific information you’ll include in those paragraphs. Taking this step ensures that your essay makes clear points. On top of that, it also makes the process of writing the paper much simpler. When you know exactly what information you’re going to include and where you’re going to include it, you’ll save a lot of time.

Remember, these are only general tips. They’re useful, but they aren’t the only points to keep in mind when writing a compare and contrast essay on human equality. The expectations of a high-school student will be different from the expectations of a graduate student. Pay attention to the specific requirements for the assignment while writing your paper, and if anything is unclear, discuss it with your instructor early in the process.

Legal writing is a very special genre. As an author you are significantly limited to certain structures, logic and unwritten rules. Although, even a very organized form of a memorandum can’t guarantee that your reader will get the message you are trying to get across. For solving such a problem it is worth to use a technique that leads the reader from the top of the article right to the end – starting with your conclusion. You must get used to the role of the “leader” while framing your writings.

“But why is starting with conclusion important?” – one may ask. Such a beginning helps your readers understand what you are going to talk about, the main matters and the structure of your memo in general. There is, actually, no unified structure of writing a memo and starting with conclusion, the point is that you shape the form according to a certain logic of storytelling. Without a doubt the main goal of writing a memorandum is to tell about all relevant facts concerning your case, so the structure generally depends on the case itself. Though, there are some tips that are worth to use that you will find further in our legal writing guide.

First of all – keep your readers attention. If you fail to draw the attention in the very beginning, the chance that the main body is going to be read carefully and intelligently is almost equal to zero:

To draw the attention, try to start with the background story, mention who are the parties and what is the nature of the issue. While telling the backstory, try to avoid lengthy sentences and complex constructions as they distracts the attention. Don’t write the facts there either.

After having mentioned some general information, move on to describing the issue. Here is the time to use some facts. Use them to make a concrete basis for further story of the case in the main body. In this part you can also make several questions which you are going to answers. The point is that this opening is going to reveal the answers. But again, avoid complex structures, state it clear and short.

One more useful tip, while framing the conclusion in the opening is the use simple language. As it was mentioned above, using complicated language forms is completely inappropriate. The beginning of your writing must be clean and straightforward without any unnecessary information.

You may even try saying your sentences out loud. Check if they sound plain enough. Fix all awkward sentences.

Write as you would speak to your colleague. That sort of semi-formal speech is just perfect for writing. It involves a lot of special vocabulary to convey all the nuances you are talking about but with plain grammar at the same time.

Remember that the opening is going to tell your reader what to look for later on. Place the strongest writings in the very first paragraphs to emphasize them properly.

The Roman Empire – a state that existed for more than a millennium and had the greatest influence on history, culture, language and laws of Europe. A state that had started as a kingdom and ended up as two empires. Such an enormous country was sure to have a well-balanced system of rules, rights and laws to govern all its provinces, that rarely shared similar customs and rites.

The History of Roman law dates back to the times when Rome was just a Mediterranean kingdom. Latini – the natives, had own rules and customs of governing, having property and solving disputes. It was not a system, though, rather a number of unwritten laws that often contradicted each other. According to a legend, citizens of Rome decided to write down the laws to avoid contradictions. After eight years of struggle, the plebeian class convinced the patricians to send delegates to Greek cities to copy their law system. No matter if it was a reality or not, the Roman law had changed significantly over time.

Roman law as many other ancient legal systems was based on the principle of personality, it means that the law of the state could be applied only to citizens of a state (ius civile). Foreigners had rights in the Roman state only in case of mutual treaties that granted protection, otherwise a foreigner was considered as property and any Roman citizen that could seize him or her and proclaim the rights of possession. Though it was in the interests of the state to protect the foreigners, as, in most cases, they were traders, Ius gentium was created – a legal system that was applied when one of the subjects was non-citizen.

The oldest written legal text of the Roman state was “the Twelve Tablets” dating from 5th century CE. Later, with the adoption of the principle of personality, Ius civile was developed – a very ceremonial and symbolic legislative system that was rather representation of old rites and ways of solving disputes. The result of numerous expansion and growing trade interests of the Roman state was Ius gentium. Due to its flexibility it became very popular among magistrates.

Romans used to divide their laws into written and unwritten (ius scriptum, ius non scriptum). Unwritten law represented customs, while written law was based literally on any written source. Written law could be performed in five ways:

Leges (singular lex, the earliest one – the Twelve Tablets) – concerned matters of family law, torts, offences and other legal procedures.

Edicta – were usually issued by praetors (one praetor office concerned citizens, another non-citizens). As in later republic edicta became a type of reform – leges ceased to be the main source of private law.

Senatus consulta – were not actually a legal document, rather an advice to magistrates, which could be then accepted. In the time of early empire Roman senate ceased to have real power and their resolutions just supported the proposals of the emperor. Later on, only emperor’s proposals had real legislative power.

Constitutiones principum – were in fact the emperor’s legislative expressions.

Responsa prudentium – this type of written law represented answers of learned lawyers. Those legal advisers were not professionals and had no legislative power, they were just educated men giving free legal pieces of advice. Although during the reign of Augustus some of them were given power to advice with the emperor’s authority.

Legal education takes a special place in the education system of the world. This is due to the fact that legal profession is aimed at solving many issues connected with functioning of the state and provision of full protection of civil rights and freedoms. Lawyers make decisions that define the authority and respect of the state and decisions that are extremely important for the fate of every man. Poorly educated lawyers are a risk for both government and society.

Legal education needs further development and constant improvements to be implemented to provide the state with well qualified lawyers. It is needed to hold a series of practical steps towards the internationalization of legal education. The internationalization process is based on three main elements: presence of international component in the content of curricula and programs, international mobility of students and professors, existence of programs of cooperation and mutual assistance.

Prestige Is Not Enough

Institute of Higher Education of China, Jiao Tong University conducted a global ranking of universities and among the top ten universities providing legal education there are six US universities and four universities of the UK. Indicators that were taken into consideration during the study are: opinion of students, research and scientific performance, admission to the university criteria, ratio of students and teachers, financial cost on providing library and computer equipment to students, costs spent on students, not related to educational process factors (sport, health facilities attendance), quality of graduates (percentage of graduates who received a diploma with honors), employment prospects of graduates, percentage of students who passed the full course. The components of education quality are different, but the most important ones were: students opinion, effectiveness of admission procedure to institutions, human and material resources in universities, overall reputation of institutions that provide legal education.

Good Job Position

Good legal job position can be received if you have good knowledge in legal sphere and know the how to implement your knowledge. There are also other factors that promote being selected for a good position in legal sphere. The employee must have all the necessary personal qualities and a set amount of professional knowledge and skills. These personal qualities are: intelligence, developed sense of duty and responsibility to perform their duties, integrity and independence of the decision, dedication, wish to counteract injustice, high morality, professional ethics, personal integrity, sociability. But apart from theoretical knowledge, the person must also have good practical skills. The person must be good at public speaking, know how to hold the meetings, conversations and other forms of communication with the public.

Law Recruitment Ways

There are many ways via which law recruitment is made. First, recruiting candidates for the vacant position on recommendations of friends and relatives who work or used to work in the searching company. Second, “independent” candidates who are looking for work independently without reference to the agency and employment service by straightly calling the organization. Third, the media, the most common recruitment technique is advertisements of the available vacancies.

There is a recruitment diversity in legal education, but the main aim is to hire a highly skilled person who will be a real asset in the company.

The ability to properly, accurately convey your thoughts by means of language is the highest culture of speech. But the ability to properly convey your thoughts and at the same time to be brief, to the point and clear in legal writing is a perfect mastery. Legal writing requires specific knowledge not just in linguistic sphere, but in judicial as well.

Only well-qualified lawyers who have sufficient knowledge not only in the field of law, but in other spheres of public life as well, can be real experts in legal writing. The primary reason of legal writing is to give information, persuade in the given and make the influence on the reader and the audience of their interests, mood, feelings and behavior. Legal writing must have scientific content and comply with the norms of legal writing.

There are different factors that can help lawyers to be brief, to the point and clear in this craft so here we present to you a few legal writing tips that will help.

Clarity of Thought

First, clarity of thought and accurately presented information. The main goal of each message, either written or an oral one, is to get the word out. The most important quality of a successful legal writing is considered to be accuracy. It must be remembered that inaccurately selected word in an oral speech can be corrected, but in the written one it can’t be done.

Logic

Second, logic and semantic accuracy (uniqueness) of presented information. Legal writing requires the most exact, logical, unequivocal expression of thought and form of thinking. All the facts and the information must be placed in a strict logical order. Clarity is achieved by a clear composition, logical exposition, persuasive arguments. Clarity involves the use of complex syntax and semantics to express the thoughts, especially in the reasoning and the operative part of the documents.

Brevity

Third, conciseness, lack of verbosity and avoidance of unnecessary, irrelevant thoughts. Laconism is a key to success in every legal writing. But being brief doesn’t mean forgetting about grammar rules. The shorter the sentences the more chances are that the reader will catch the main idea and bullet points in the text. It’s important to get rid of legalese jargon, too ink-horn terms.

Vocabulary

Fourth, proper vocabulary and use of language. Legal writing requires the knowledge of technical terminology, specialized phrases and words used in legal sphere. Formality is another outstanding feature that has to be taken into consideration. It’s also very important to remember about the intended audience depending on the type of the document you are compiling. Writing must be properly organized and guide the reader by means of introduction paragraphs, linking words, headings and subheadings that are a road map to the reader.

To sum up, the main tool of every top-tier lawyer is the language. By means of the language we can compile legal writings, stand up for the rights of the clients, appear before a court and simply communicate with each other. Whatever writings you made before, it has nothing to do with compiling the legal ones which are absolutely different and difficult to make.

Selection of job and future profession in the law sphere is a challenging thing for graduates and their parents. But a more challenging task is to choose the law school to enter. There are a lot of law institutions these days where you can get a good education to become a top-tier lawyer. But more and more people stop applying for legal schools and those who applied may never even work in this sphere throughout their lives.

There is a huge decrease of attendees and applicants to law schools nowadays. As a result, a lot of institutions have to come up with a more flexible schedule, cut the classes, reduce tuition and what is more, some of them are obliged to shut their doors once and forever due to the shortage of applicants. If such tendency continues to exist, we may encounter law job stagnation.

In the year 2014 there was a drop of attendees and applicants by 30% from four previous years. In 2016, the number of law students applying for the schools had slightly dropped by 2,3% which is not much compared with the year 2014. It was in 1973 when the enrolments were this low. There are small sized classes as a result and in some schools there is also a lack of students. Even the best law schools are attracting less students. Now it’s getting more and more easy to get into law school due to the less competition. The major reason for this is Great Recession and market crash.

There are a lot of factors that led to this law school applications drop.

Lower Interest of Applicants in Legal Sphere and Education in Particular

Some attendees want to get a legal education just for the sake of appearance. Some applicants are not even sure whether they want to work in this sphere in future, they stick to the statement that lawyers are always in demand and it would be useful and prestigious to have such education.

Job Challenges That Lawyers Encounter Seem to Be Too Intimidating for the Applicants

Legal education is a hard nut to crack and you need to spend a lot of sleepless nights to gain decent knowledge in this sphere. Apart from theory, practice is needed and the more practice you have the better prospects of becoming a qualified lawyer are ahead of you.

Low Test Scores, Underperformance and Poor Level of Knowledge

Applicants get very bad and low scores and don’t meet the admission test requirements while applying for the school. Lots of people find Law School Admission test very difficult and fail at it.

High Price to Pay for Education

Price does matter in terms of paying for the education, especially for the legal one where the image and rating of the university you are applying for is of the utmost importance.

To sum up, drastic changes will happen to the legal education and law schools graduates due to this law school applications decrease. New educational approaches, new reforms, new types of schools, new types of students will be different from what they are today.

Every person had encountered a situation where he or she faced an issue by receiving poor service or bad treatment from other people. In order to prevent such cases in future people file letters of complaint to appropriate authorities that later deal with this issue. Some people find it difficult to compile such types of letters and may include a lot of negative emotions in it rather than facts. Below you can find the tips that may help you to make a federal court complaint.

Outline the Case Correctly

In a federal law complaint describe the situation clearly and in an understandable way, also make sure that the issue described in letter is a legitimate one. If you have any problems with compiling a letter, you can ask the help of professionals. Help of paper writing service is legal and may help you to provide concise, yet all the necessary information. It is important to include valid and profound evidence and a timeline of events.

Include Necessary Information

It’s important to indicate all the necessary information in the paper, such as: address, full name, discriminated party’s name, telephone numbers and the quickest way to reach both parties. Address and name of the organization, person or business that made the discrimination is to be included as well. Extra information that can support the complaint is to be indicated as well. It has to be signed to be presented for the hearing. Some federal district courts prefer the document to be filed via electronic way.

Mind Structural Elements

While compiling a federal court complaint it is recommended to structure it properly. Federal complaint consists of various structural elements. The first element is heading or caption, it has a brief description of the complaint, parties involved and a court where the case is to be originated. Filing attorney’s name, address and telephone number are indicated in this section as well.

The second element is venue or jurisdiction, where selected court for the case hearing is indicated along with the explanations as for why exactly this court was chosen. The third element is parties involved, where defendants and plaintiffs are mentioned. In the fourth section definitions, terms and notions used in the document are defined and explained. Statement of facts is the fifth element where the evidence that brought the case to the court is described.

The sixth element “cause of action” or “counts” has a list with the legal allegations with detailed information about the application of the governing law to every court. Existing Law and previous decisions are indicated in this section as well. The seventh element “injury” provides the information on how seriously plaintiff’s rights were harmed by the defendant. Last element is called “demand for relief” which describes the plaintiff’s relief in seeking as a result of the lawsuit. Required compensation and damages are listed here as well.

To sum up, federal complaint is a hard nut to crack and needs studious preparation and knowledge to compile it in the right way. Due to the fact that it’s a legal document, it requires the help of an attorney or writing service, time and legal knowledge.

Famous proverb says: “Live and learn” and the more you learn, the better future you will have and the bigger career perspectives are ahead of you. Education plays an important role in everyone’s life and due to today’s sophisticated technologies and advancements in educational sphere there are a lot of interesting courses to take and various careers to choose from. Every person has the possibility to get an education even without leaving the house, the only thing needed is a wish and the Internet connection. You can become a successful lawyer or get an MBA, it’s only the matter of time and money.

There is a constant dilemma: what sphere to choose and what courses to take. To do business, or to do law – that is the question and the question is a challenging one. Person’s skills, desired income and goals in life can help to define whether law or business education is more suitable for this person. For many people it’s not an easy choice to make.

When comparing business education vs law, there are many people who consider business education to be more interesting and useful one rather than the law education.

High Career Prospects

First, business education gives higher career prospects for businessmen and businesswomen and for some of them it can happen very quickly. In the law sphere it’s not that easy to get high career prospects at once and it takes much time to become a well know lawyer and get a top position in this sphere.

Good Income

Second, business education has a stable, fixed income with the ability to earn extra money at the same time. Being a businessman gives a possibility to one day get rich due to a lucrative project, good value or simply luck. Being a lawyer, even a top one, means having your income determined by hours billed and hours spent working. As a result, the more hours you work, the more money you make.

No Further Exams to Take

Third, business education needs no further exams and knowledge tests to pass. Getting an MBA doesn’t require repeat tests or exams unlike for lawyers. Lawyers need to pass Bar Exam or Continuing Legal Education exam that need studious preparation, profound knowledge and a lot of practice. There is a constant need for qualifications if you have a wish to be a lawyer or a barrister and you need to pay for such education every time. Having got an MBA gives you a green light to practice business and continue your education even in a different sphere.

Unlimited Possibilities

Fourth, business education implies unlimited possibilities and diversity. Business sphere is very wide in terms of careers to choose and spheres to work at. You may have a couple of different business enterprises that are in different countries and it gives you an ability to develop in different ways. Of course, the law is also constantly changing and you need to keep up to date, but as a rule, the work lawyers do is almost repetitive, such as paperwork filling, dealing with the same or similar cases.

There are people who think that you need to be born a businessman and have an inborn talent and liking for this. And whatever business courses you take or whatever business schools and universities you attend, it has to be bred in your bone. Business is not learnt, it has to be in your blood.

To sum up, it’s never too late to study and learn something new and interesting, whatever you find more gainful in battle of business education vs law. The only important thing is to clearly understand what sphere is not only to your liking, but what sphere you are more skilled at.